Kai complied, but kept his hand on the woman’s throat. ‘Talk. If it’s true that we’ve been poisoned, I’m not in the mood to waste time.’

Irene and Vale should have been back by now. And what if all this was an attempt to distract him from their absence? Their contact for the book purchase would be here in fifteen minutes, and Irene would never miss that. A combined twist of fear and fury knotted in his guts. If something had happened to them while he was babysitting Catherine . . .

The door creaked open, and an elderly woman shouldered her way in. She bore all the markers of Victorian widowhood: a heavy black bonnet shadowed her face, a dark woollen shawl hugged her shoulders, and her black bombazine dress dragged on the floor as she walked. It left a damp trail like a slug’s passage. Behind her followed a younger woman, modestly dressed, carrying a small suitcase in one hand and a hastily furled umbrella in the other. She was dripping miserably – clearly she hadn’t been the one under the umbrella. If these were their contacts, they were early.

‘Dear me,’ the elderly woman said, leaning forward like a hungry stork. ‘Have I interrupted something?’

Even as she spoke, Kai heard an explosion far out at sea. The island trembled in response, and Kai felt the waves mount in tumult, thundering in the aftermath of some cataclysm far below. He froze in shock.

CHAPTER FOUR

The explosion drew everyone’s eyes seaward. Even though Kai could already feel the ocean’s shuddering disquiet, he couldn’t help turning to stare at the tossing waves outside.

But his affinity with water couldn’t tell him what he most wanted to know. Where were Irene and Vale? Had they been trapped out there? Were they dead? Every impulse urged him to take on his natural dragon form and plunge down into the sea to find them.

‘Oh, hello,’ Catherine said faintly. Her eyes were fixed on Kai, begging him to do something, and she looked even paler now. ‘You must be Madame Pipet.’

‘What a clever young girl you are,’ the old woman exclaimed. She sat down in the nearest chair, her attendant standing behind her. ‘So are you the Miss Winters I’m supposed to meet?’

For a moment Kai was strongly tempted to say Yes, and leave it to Catherine to handle the situation while he went to find Irene. But he saw the sheer panic in Catherine’s eyes, and his sense of honour forced him to stay.

‘No, madame,’ he said. ‘Miss Winters has temporarily stepped out. But we are empowered to act on her behalf.’

It would only take a couple of minutes to exchange the money for the book. Then he could be out of here and looking for Irene. Besides, if he prioritized saving her rather than collecting the book, she’d make him regret it.

‘I’ll take your word for it,’ the old woman said, a mercenary glint in her eye. ‘Assuming you have the money. And you still haven’t told me why you have your hand around Julie’s neck.’

At least it wasn’t Take your hands off that woman or I’ll call the police! ‘She was trying to blackmail us by claiming she’d poisoned us.’ A flash of inspiration made him add, ‘She was trying to interfere with the deal for some reason of her own. I don’t suppose you’d know anything about that?’

‘Oh, was she now?’ Madame Pipet spat something in the local Guernésiais, or Guernsey French. Kai couldn’t understand the meaning, but it clearly frightened the woman in Kai’s grip, who trembled under his hand.

Madame Pipet shifted to English. ‘You, Julie Robilliard. You don’t have the courage to challenge me up on Pleinmont or in front of La Gran’ Mère, so instead you try to sneak round behind my back and steal what’s mine. What game are you playing?’

Julie swallowed nervously. ‘We, ah, that is I –’ She looked round desperately at Kai. ‘You’ll protect me?’

‘Well, I won’t kill you on the spot,’ Kai said. ‘I make no promises for Madame Pipet.’

‘I was given something to put in your food,’ she babbled. ‘I was told there would be three people, two women and a man, and your names, and that I was to give you the poison and then get you to come with me to the church. If I did that then I’d get to keep the money you’d brought with you. But the other woman wasn’t with you, so I tried to go ahead with it, but then –’ Her gesture took in the utter failure of the operation.

‘And who made this deal with you?’ Kai demanded.

‘I don’t know his name,’ Julie said hastily. Her eyes flicked to Madame Pipet. ‘He was from France . . . he was very polite, very upper class, he had a beard . . .’ She trailed off, clearly aware her story wasn’t very convincing.

But Madame Pipet nodded, as though she’d heard something she expected to hear. ‘Another attempt to make me step down, hmm? Working with the smugglers, maybe? Well, I’ll be generous, since you’ve spoken so freely. Get out of here and don’t let me see you again in a month of Fridays, or I’ll give you and your family reason to regret it.’

Julie Robilliard stammered something unintelligible, squirmed free of Kai’s grip and fled the room. He considered following her to bring her back, but decided it wasn’t worth it: she was a pawn with no useful information.

‘You let her go? But she’s poisoned us!’ Catherine objected.

Madame Pipet shrugged. ‘That’s not my problem, little girl. Besides, you don’t look very poisoned. Nice bright eyes, a flush to your cheeks, good strong voice. I’m sure she was lying.’

And if she was telling the truth, Kai thought, you don’t particularly care, as long as you get your money. ‘Very well,’ he said. ‘We’ve delayed long enough. Shall we go through with the exchange?’

At the side, Catherine was trying to catch his eye. ‘Kai,’ she said through gritted teeth, ‘I want to become a Librarian. I don’t want to die in agony!’

Kai wondered if he’d ever been that obstructive when Irene was trying to make a deal.

Madame Pipet ignored the byplay and gestured to her attendant. The younger woman put the suitcase she was carrying on a table and unlocked it, displaying a bundle of shawls. She unfolded them to reveal a heavy book bound in battered black leather, with a silver falcon stamped on the front.

‘There you are,’ she said. ‘Malory’s La Vie de Merlin. The companion to his Morte d’Arthur, from a print run by Caxton. Very limited, for a very exclusive clientele.’

The sight of the book distracted Catherine from her complaints. She leaned forward to peer at it, clearly itching to touch it. ‘Authentic?’ she asked.

‘You’re free to examine it, though I know you’re in a hurry.’ Madame Pipet shrugged. ‘But don’t let me make your decisions for you.’

Kai knew exactly what Irene would do under these circumstances. He restrained himself from looking out towards the ocean, where the waves still churned in furious disruption. ‘Check it,’ he told Catherine.

Fortunately Irene had left the payment with him. Kai reached into his jacket and brought out a heavy buff envelope. He opened it, extracting a signed bank draft with a satisfactory number of zeroes attached to the sum. ‘I trust this will suffice?’